John Donovan, Jr.

John Donovan was born and raised in Houston, Texas and attended college in Austin at the University of Texas. After graduating from UT in 2000 with degrees in Finance and Accounting, Mr. Donovan joined the Houston Energy Investment Banking division of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette which was acquired shortly thereafter by Credit Suisse.

During his tenure at Credit Suisse, Mr. Donovan participated in nearly $9 billion in transactions across 14 distinct deals in a variety of arenas including, (i) public equity, debt and hybrid security underwritings and (ii) financial advisory assignments such as mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, joint ventures and structured financings. After a few years at Credit Suisse, Mr. Donovan joined Quantum Energy Partners where he would shift his focus away from large-cap, public companies and more towards private, start-up E&P companies.

At the time Mr. Donovan joined Quantum, the firm had just raised their second fund and was operating with just over $325 million in assets under management. Mr. Donovan was the fourth investment manager to join the team and focused primarily on making $25-$50 million investments in start-up energy exploration and production companies. Mr. Donovan participated in all aspects of Quantum’s investment activities including origination, due diligence, transaction structuring and execution, portfolio company monitoring and transaction realizations. Quantum had tremendous success deploying and/or harvesting investments across five distinct funds, including two IPO’s, during Mr. Donovan’s five-year tenure. At the time of his departure, Mr. Donovan had helped grow Quantum’s assets under management 10-fold from $325 million to over $3 billion and was serving as a Director on three portfolio company boards.

Donovan Ventures was established in 2007 as an energy merchant bank and was designed to complement Mr. Donovan’s diverse capital markets experience with the operational skills of an energy entrepreneur. Since inception, Donovan Capital has closed over $1 billion million in private equity, mezzanine, term loan and senior debt financings and advisory transactions.

Additionally, Mr. Donovan has aggregated a portfolio of private oilfield service and E&P companies that are managed by seasoned energy entrepreneurs. An opportunistic investor, Mr. Donovan targets investment opportunities that can be enhanced through his industry relationships and advisory expertise. In 2016, Donovan Ventures formed its first private equity fund, Energy Founders Fund, LP to invest in early-stage energy companies. Since its first energy investment in 2010, Donovan Ventures’ private equity division has invested in 12 distinct companies.